Marxism in the American Grain

The work of Karl Marx has been taken up by a huge range of American writers, from a wide variety of perspectives. As Harry Harootunian argues in this provocative pamphlet, however, there is an indelible American stamp to this scholarship that unites it across diverse disciplines and schools of thought. Focusing in particular on the post-war years, Harootunian tracks American Marxism’s chapters in recent history, tracing the movement from its disengagement with the American Communist Party to how it negotiated the Cold War struggle with Stalinism; from the fall of the Berlin Wall to the momentary triumphalism of Third World liberation movements. He concludes with a look at how the succumbing of much Marxist thought to neoliberal globalism has paved the way for the reappearance of fascist oligarchs. The result for historical practice, cultural studies, and social theory has been, as Harootunian shows, a radical disconnect between abstract analysis and the tangible agendas of social movements and sectarian factionalism.